60 



MISSISSIPPIS FOREST RESOURCES AND INDUSTRIES 



Figure 52. — Very poor cutting practice. Except Jor a Jew widely scattered seed trees, all nurchantable pine sawlog timber was removed from this 

 stand. If the few remaining seed trees had been removed, this cutting would have been classed destructive. 



The appraisal of fire protection on each owner's 

 property was based on efforts made by the individual 

 owner or the State to control fires, and on the effective- 

 ness of protection as measured by average annual burn. 

 All wildfire was considered undesirable. Average 

 annual burn applied to the past 10 years unless tenure 

 of the present owner or the period of protection was 

 shorter, in which case the actual tenure or period of 

 protection was used. If the individual owner plowed 

 protective lanes or roads around and through his 

 forest land, fought fire, or hired others to fight fire 

 on his land, he was credited with effort in fire protec- 

 tion. 



The critical point in the range of fire-protection 

 classification was taken to be that at which the aver- 



age annual burn was less than 10 percent where con- 

 trol efforts were made, or less than 5 percent where 

 no control efforts were made.^^ Properties which met 

 at least these minimum standards of effort and effec- 



" These percentages were set higher than the customary 

 standards for a wide area because a larger proportion of an 

 individual property where fire occurs may be expected to 

 burn in a given period than would be the case for a wide 

 area. 



A higher percentage is allowed for properties where con- 

 trol effort is made than for those where no effort is made 

 in order to give credit for such effort when fires occur. 

 Because a protected property could be expected to have a 

 lower percentage burn than an unprotected property when 

 subjected to the same fire occurrence, the latter should be 

 required to show a better experience record than the former 

 to qualify for an equal rating. 



